Kasmaal  Independent Somali news and analysis website .

Mosul (IraqiNews.com) Iraqi forces have taken over 70 percent of western Mosul’s Old City district, Islamic State militants’ last refuge in Iraq’s second largest city, police forces said. Federal Police chief, Lt. Gen. Shaker Jawdat, said his forces moved Wednesday through al-Farouq street towards Bab al-Toub, Serjkhana, Bab Jadid and Bab Lakash, all areas in […]

The Russian chief of staff, General Valery Gerasimov, accompanied Assad, according to a statement by Russia’s Defense Ministry. The two discussed coordinating actions of the Syrian government forces with the help of the Russian military against Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) and the Al-Nusra Front in Syria. Assad and Gerasimov also talked about implementing the […]

CARACAS, Venezuela — President Nicolas Maduro said a stolen police helicopter fired on Venezuela’s Supreme Court Tuesday in what he called a thwarted “terrorist attack” aimed at ousting him from power. The confusing exchange, which is bound to ratchet up tensions in a country already paralyzed by months of deadly anti-government protests, took place as […]

US Defense Secretary Jim Mattis on Tuesday left open the possibility of longer-term assistance to Kurdish YPG militia in Syria, saying the US may need to supply them weapons and equipment even after the capture of Raqqa from ISIS. NATO ally Turkey, which views the YPG as a threat, has said Mattis assured it in […]

Pyongyang has likened U.S. President Donald Trump to Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler, characterizing Trump’s “America First” policy as “the American version of Nazism,” state media reported Tuesday, as Washington grapples with the North Korean nuclear issue. Tens of thousands of men and women pump their fists in the air and chant as they carry placards […]

A federal judge halted late on Monday the deportation of all Iraqi nationals detained during immigration sweeps across the United States this month until at least July 10, expanding a stay he imposed last week. The stay had initially only protected 114 detainees from the Detroit area. Family members of detainees line up to enter […]

German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Monday softened for the first time her opposition to gay marriage, as her conservative party comes under growing pressure on the issue ahead of elections in September. Merkel, who had repeatedly voiced her opposition to gay marriage, said that lawmakers could vote according to their conscience, and not toe the […]

LONDON: The World Health Organization (WHO) has thanked Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, deputy prime minister and minister of defense, for his donation of $66.7 million to stop the spread of cholera in Yemen. In response to an urgent call for funding, the King Salman Center for Relief and Humanitarian Aid (KSRelief) in Saudi […]

BEIJING – The United States urged China on Tuesday to give cancer-stricken Nobel Peace Prize laureate Liu Xiaobo and his wife freedom to move and choose his own doctors after he was granted medical parole. The U.S. Embassy in Beijing said it was “working to gather more information” about Liu’s legal and medical status after […]

A Russian submarine has successfully launched a missile from the Barents Sea near Norway to a test site in the Kamchatka Peninsula in the Far East, the Russian Defense Ministry reports. “The strategic Borey-class nuclear submarine, Yuri Dolgoruky, has successfully fired the Bulava intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) from a designated area in the Barents Sea […]